Category Archives: RMS(one)

This is a taster of an article published in the second edition of EXPOSURE magazine. Click here and download your full copy now.

Farhana Alarakhiya, vice president, products at RMS, writes… In my recent article in EXPOSURE magazine, I was interested in exploring how firms in the insurance sector can move towards building a more analytics-driven organization. Being analytics-driven translates to being an agile business, and in a turbulent market landscape, building underwriting agility is becoming critical to business survival.

There is no doubt we have seen revolutionary technological advances and an explosion of new digital data sources, which has reinvented the core disciplines of insurers over the past 15 years. Many (re)insurers also see big data and analytics (BD&A) as a “silver bullet” to provide competitive advantage and address their current market challenges.

Similar to other industries who continue to invest heavily in BD&A to secure their position and open a new chapter of growth, the insurance sector is also ramping up investment, in open BD&A platforms such as RMS(one)®, which is purpose-built for the insurance industry. But although there is a real buzz around BD&A, what may be lacking is a big data strategy specifically for evolving pricing, underwriting and risk selection, areas which provide huge potential gains for firms.

With the opportunity for our industry to gain transformational agility in analytics now within reach, we need to be conscious of how to avoid DRIP, being data rich, but information poor, with too much focus being on data capture, management, and structures, at the expense of creating useable insights that can be fed to the people at the point of impact. Regulation is not the barrier to success either, many other regulated business areas have transformed their business and gained agility through effective analytics.

Please read the full article in EXPOSURE magazine to discover more about the three main lessons insurers can learn from other businesses who have their BD&A recipe just right, but here’s a short summary:

Lesson #1 – Delivering Analytics to the Point of Impact

Being reliant on back office processes for analytics is common for insurers, but doesn’t work for a frontline healthcare worker, for example. Data analysts are rare in this sector, because a healthcare worker has analytics designed around their role, to support their delivery. If you look at a portfolio manager in the insurance sector, they typically work in tandem with an analyst to get relevant data, let alone insight, which compromises their ability to perform effectively.

Lesson #2 – Ensuring Usability

Recognizing the workflow of an analytics user and giving due consideration to the veracity of the data provided to reduce uncertainty is vital. Looking at our healthcare example, analytics tools used by doctors to diagnose a patient’s condition use standardized information – age, sex, weight, height, ethnicity, address – and the patient’s symptoms.

They are provided not with a defined prognosis but a set of potential diagnoses accompanied by a probability score and the sources. Imagine this level of analytical capability provided in real-time at the point of underwriting, where the underwriter not only has access to the right set of analytics, they also have a clear understanding of other options and underlying assumptions.

Lesson #3 – Integration into the Common Workflow

To achieve data nirvana, BD&A output needs to integrate naturally into daily business-as-usual operations. When analytics are embedded directly into the daily workflow, there is a far higher success rate of it being put to effective use. With customer service technology, all the required systems are directly integrated into the customer agents’ software for a holistic view of the customer. Using platforms built and designed with open architecture allows legacy systems or your specific intellectual property-intensive processes to be integrated, for access to analytics that allow them to derive insights as part of the daily workflow for every risk they write.

This is a taster of an article published in the second edition of EXPOSURE magazine. Click here and download your full copy now.

Watch Video: Farhana Alarakhiya – The Data Challenge Is Getting It to the Right People

Farhana Alarakhiya, vice president, products at RMS, said insurers are responding to the allure of big data, but must focus on turning voluminous data into meaningful insights. Alarakhiya spoke with A.M. BestTV at the Exceedance 2017 conference.

The quote above is from Conrad Wolfram, the renowned British mathematician, well known as an advocate for the advancement of mathematics teaching. He argues that teaching students how to calculate using computers is more effective and more liberating than teaching calculation by hand. In his talk at TEDGlobal 2010, he describes his four-step process to solve a math problem:

Pose the right question

Formulize the question

Computation

Verifying that the computation answered the question

Currently, Wolfram believes 80 percent of math education focuses on step three – computation – and teaching people how to compute by hand. Instead, he proposes “…we ought to use computers to do step three, so students can spend much more effort on learning how to do steps one, two and four – conceptualizing problems, applying them.”

The proper development and utilization of modern computer systems, including hardware and software advances, should enable Wolfram’s vision to come true, with users moving their allocated time away from calculations and process – stage three issues – and moving it to conceptualizing problems and applying the solutions effectively. And through my recent hands-on experience, I am confident that Risk Modeler, powered by RMS(one)®, will truly allow risk analysts to modify that time allocation. I shared my experience of Risk Modeler on the keynote stage at Exceedance, and I invite you to watch the video below.

In 1999, a Legend Was Born

Many of you reading this may not realize it, but RiskLink® celebrates its 18th birthday this September. RiskLink was born in 1999, and for some of you, RiskLink started its cat modeling career before you did. I can remember using RiskLink back then, and it is a testament to the quality of that product that it is still the predominant catastrophe modeling software. I’ve grown up with it, many of us have, and with that kind of longevity and familiarity, it is no wonder that few people even consider or question what can be an elongated process involved in completing an analysis, using this bedrock of catastrophe management.

That process to access your analysis is a lot of work. File management, model profile management, financial perspective re-maps, system restrictions. Wolfram’s assumption looks reasonable, that up to 80 percent of your natural catastrophe modeling time is spent in this process.

We’ll celebrate 18 successful years of RiskLink, but the market is shifting to an embrace of big data analytics. This creates great timing for Risk Modeler. Risk Modeler is built specifically to work with large amounts of data to remove the procedural, tactical component of your work and move it to an efficient and speedy system.

How Would You Use Your Process Time?

This reallocation of process allows you to spend more time using your experience and intuition to conceptualize, understand and guide your business more effectively. You can start to ask and answer questions that anticipate the business’ needs. You can spend more time proactively working on change management with your key stakeholders. You can work more directly with the underwriting teams to understand and differentiate risks more thoroughly.

Risk Modeler is an efficient interface between your insight and experience and the analytical power of cloud-based computing. It allows you to simply ask a question, and it delivers the answer. Mr. Wolfram reminds us that, “…math is not equal to calculating. Math is a much broader subject than calculating…I think of calculating, in a sense, as the machinery of math. It’s the chore. It’s the thing you’d like to avoid if you can, like to get a machine to do.”

Modeling is more than process, which is the chore of risk modeling. I am excited that Risk Modeler is that system capable of completing that chore for you. You can now unleash your energy, creativity, insight, and experience on improving your company, your industry and to help make the world more resilient.

When we started RMS almost 28 years ago, the Specialty and E&S markets were among the first to embrace the benefits of catastrophe modeling. In many ways, I learned about (re)insurance at the knee of the specialty markets, which gave me an appreciation of the sophisticated and myriad ways this market provides coverage and underwrites business. What struck me then, as it does today, is the entrepreneurial nature of the specialty lines. Underwriter-driven and close to their markets, they are constantly boxing-on-their-toes to identify new opportunities to offer innovative coverage and to write profitable business.

Last week, during our annual client conference Exceedance 2017, I welcomed almost 900 participants across clients, partners, and our RMS experts and client teams. During the three-day conference, we convened a Specialty Roundtable with a cross-section of our clients from the U.S. specialty lines market to discuss the priorities for this dynamic sector of the industry.

The discussion was lively and ran across several themes, from identifying new opportunities in today’s market, to the benefits of well-informed stakeholders, to competing on data in a market increasingly driven by agile, real-time analytics.

Here are some highlights from our discussions:

Baking A Bigger Pie

“Specialty lines are all about opportunity.” said one participant, and from the discussion it became clear that the protection gap isn’t just in emerging markets. Even in the U.S., penetration and coverage for earthquake and flood risk is limited relative to the underlying exposures. Another participant stressed the need to move beyond the status quo, stating “It’s not about competing in a zero-sum game; we need to expand the market.” But although it was recognized that the current market has its challenges, one participant remarked that “…within every market there is opportunity.” We also discussed how new RMS models for earthquake and flood can help firms gain new insights to better identify and write quality business to expand the pie.

Educating the Market

Another imperative, one that came through loud and clear during the discussion, is the importance of a well-informed market. Not just for the underwriters, but also upstream with the producers and buyers. The group felt that there continues to be too much focus on using average annual loss (AAL) as the basis for placing individual accounts, with an insufficient understanding of the standard deviations, tail-correlations, and contributory metrics. This is particularly the case for earthquake risk, which is the quintessential tail-risk peril. With the April release of the updated RMS North America Earthquake Model, we’re giving clients a more complete view of the risk, with the ‘tails’ of the exceedance probability (EP) curve playing an even more important role than in the past. We discussed steps RMS is taking to inform key stakeholders, and we will continue to do more to be proactive and educate the entire market.

The Analytic Enterprise

Analytic agility was a constant theme throughout our discussion, with one participant remarking “With analytics, you’re either on the bus, or off the bus.” It was agreed that there is no half-way measure to adopting analytics. All participants emphasized the central role of the underwriter in the risk-decision process, applying their experience and judgement, supported by analytics to make sound decisions. However, there was much discussion that underwriting, portfolio management and analytics need to be increasingly agile and more tightly coupled. Statements such as “I need real-time,” were made and why critical up-to-date portfolio information is needed to be able to proactively manage their book. The importance of dynamic insight was emphasized “…underwriting works in lock-step with the portfolio; you can’t look at one without the other, particularly in this market.” And the need for empowering underwriters with analytics will only grow as “…you can never have enough data,” with the market now “more data-driven than ever.”

Having had hands-on access to the RMS(one) solutions in The Lab at Exceedance, several of the group were pleased to note its apparent benefits, from new exposure management and analytic applications to more flexible representations of contracts and financial structures. “We’re seeing a lot of contracts that are getting more complex, and RMS(one) using CDL (contract definition language) will help.”

It was motivating for me to hear the excitement for our new data and analytics platform, with one member saying “after seeing RMS(one), I’m excited that I can be more innovative.”

Continuing to stay close to what is important for our clients and their markets is a strategic priority for RMS. At a time of great change across the industry, agility is instrumental to mitigating risks and seizing new opportunities, and the specialty markets are at the forefront.

Tuesday dawned bright and sunny in New Orleans as Exceedance got underway.

More than 900 attendees joined Hemant and eight keynote speakers during the Exceedance General Session. Attendees learned how RMS continues to deliver on its client commitments with the launches of significant capabilities ranging from Version 17, including the new Version 17 RMS® North America Earthquake Model, Version 17 RMS® North Atlantic Hurricane Model, and Risk Modeler powered by RMS(one)®.

In addition to Hemant, Larry Orecklin from Microsoft took to the stage along with Emily Patterson, Mark Powell, Chris Folkman, Emily Grover-Kopek, Josh Ellingson, Ryan Ogaard and Eric Yau.

Tuesday Highlights

“Exceedance is a key part of our continuing dialogue with clients around their needs and priorities, discussing how we can better align to help meet their business goals.”

Hemant Shah, co-founder and CEO of RMS

Hemant demonstrated the superiority of the Version 17 North America Earthquake (NAEQ) Model through a personal anecdote. As you’d expect, Hemant ran the data on his own house through the model and found that his risk is down 27 percent on an expected loss with risk load factor. #lowerhemantspremium

Eric Yau announced that Risk Modeler, powered by RMS(one), will be ready for general availability in April, and described our continued commitment to RiskLink® as a standalone product, as well as being an integral part of the RMS(one) platform.

Josh Ellingson described how Risk Modeler will empower analysts to spend more time understanding the drivers of risk and applying their creativity to expand their book business by collapsing the manual processing of their modeling workflow.

The Lab is Where It’s At!

With The Lab in full swing, attendees took advantage of the opportunity to engage directly with RMS experts – getting up-close insights and training on the RMS(one) platform, Version 17 North Atlantic Hurricane Model and North America Earthquake Model, and much more. It’s truly where the action is!

The Mini Theater

Not to be outdone by The Lab, the Mini Theater on Tuesday played host to three insightful and engaging presentations focused on building resilience in an ever-changing world. Topics included Enhancing Urban Resilience: Managing Risk to Critical Infrastructure; Stories from the Field: Nepal Impact Trek with Build Change, and Road to Coastal Habitats in Managing Natural Hazards.

Monday RMS Welcome Reception a Hit

Last night’s RMS Welcome Reception was a hit – and not just because of the live jazz music. The well attended two-hour welcome event included plenty of mingling, great discussions, and delicious bites.

Put on Your Mask and Come to the Party!

For those of you in attendance at Exceedance, join us in The Lab from 6:00 to 8:00 p.m. to celebrate our special New Orleans-themed masquerade (no costumes required, but masks will be provided). It will be a fun evening where you can engage with RMS leaders, scientists, and strategists as they reveal the latest RMS solutions.

New Orleans is known for its unique cuisine (crawfish, anyone??), cool music (the birthplace of jazz), Mardi Gras (party!!) – and for the better part of this week – Exceedance 2017.

Yes, Exceedance is finally here, and we’re looking forward to an exciting line up of informative sessions, up-close training, engaging speakers, and networking opportunities. For those of you who can’t join us at Exceedance this year, look for highlights on Twitter and here on the blog, as we publish throughout the event.

Welcome Reception

Get set to mingle tonight at the RMS Welcome Reception, from 6:00 to 8:00 p.m. in Vitascope and the 8 Block Bar at the Hyatt Regency. It’s the perfect venue to enjoy savory hors d’oeuvres, catch up with friends, colleagues, and RMS staff members, and soak up some authentic jazz.

Ready, Set, Go!

RMS has listened and worked closely with our clients to innovate the type of solutions that support their strategic business needs. In 2017, we’re delivering on these commitments with a significant set of capabilities ranging from Version 17 (including highlights such as the RMS® North Atlantic Earthquake model and the RMS® North America Hurricane Model), to Risk Modeler.

Over the course of the next three days you’ll be able to choose from 105 sessions across 23 different tracks, three General Sessions, The Lab and Mini Theater with up close training that only Exceedance can offer. Exceedance is where the latest modeling, analytics, and technology all come together!

Don’t forget, you can check on events, tailor your schedule, review session times, set up meetings – all with the Exceedance 2017 Mobile App. If you haven’t downloaded it, go to your app store and search for “Exceedance”.

We’ll keep you posted via this blog on each day’s highlights, so check back. And welcome to Exceedance!

If you are joining us in New Orleans for Exceedance 2017 in just a few days from now, I wanted to send a quick reminder of all there is to see and do, starting Monday with our pre-conference activities.

The Exceedance agenda reflects our commitment to deliver value to clients in a rapidly changing market, including new solutions to increase operational effectiveness, agility, resilience, and business growth.

You’ll have many opportunities to dive deep into more than 20 new models, including the RMS® North America Earthquake Model and the RMS® North Atlantic Hurricane Model, major advances in science, software, and HD-simulation models, The Lab, and more.

For information on the keynote speakers, tracks and sessions, and The Lab, visit the conference website exceedance.rms.com.

All Work and No Play? Not at Exceedance!

Along with experiencing all there is to discover and learn at Exceedance, there are plenty of opportunities to relax and have some fun with the following pre-conference and evening activities:

RMS Welcome Reception: Get set to party as Exceedance kicks off in style with a jazz-flavored welcome reception on Monday evening.

Evening Reception in The Lab: Tuesday night offers a festive celebration of New Orleans’ tradition with a colorful masquerade party (masks provided) – in The Lab. You’ll also have a chance to engage with RMS leaders, scientists, and strategists as they reveal the latest RMS solutions.

Exceedance Party (EP) “A Taste of New Orleans”: Evening festivities conclude on Wednesday with “A Taste of New Orleans,” including three “can’t miss” hallmarks of New Orleans: Jazz Night Club, Mardi Gras, and Louisiana Cajun. Be ready to put on your dancing shoes and show us your voodoo…

Watch for Our Daily Blog During Exceedance

We will be posting a daily blog on these pages during Exceedance to give you a round-up of the highlights so far including sessions, The Lab, keynote speakers, special events, and more. Please keep an eye out for it!

With Exceedance 2017 coming March 20 to 23, RMS has announced an impressive line-up of keynote speakers ready to provide their insights, ideas and inspiration to help attendees jumpstart their planning and adoption of new RMS solutions and model updates.
The ten keynotes cover a wide range of topics, including:

The Future of Modeling Powered by the RMS(one)® Platform: With the modeling base expanding to encompass new classes, speakers reveal the latest science and industry-leading advances in tools and data analytics, that will deliver breakthroughs in operational efficiency and business agility.

Jeffrey P. Hebert, deputy mayor of New Orleans and the city’s first chief resilience officer

Tanya Harris, community outreach manager, Make It Right Foundation

Hemant Shah, RMS co-founder and CEO

Leading RMS experts including Dr. Robert Muir Wood, Dr. Andrew Coburn, and others.

Along with these keynote speakers, this year’s Exceedance will see more than 20 guest speakers share their insights, with experts and opinion formers from across the industry.

Throughout Exceedance, there will be many opportunities for interaction with model experts, up-close team training, networking opportunities, and so much more. In The Lab over 50 RMS scientists and modelers will offer technical insights and training – and can meet clients one-to-one for personalized support.

Exceedance 2017 will be here in three weeks. Make your plans to join us!

With the upcoming releases of Risk Modeler on the RMS(one) platform and Version 17 in April, this is an important year for RMS and our clients. If you’re not already attending, register for Exceedance now and experience 22 tracks, 105 sessions, and engage with 250 RMS experts – it’s four days of support and enablement to maximize success for you and your team!

For complete information on the keynote speakers, tracks and sessions, and The Lab, visit the conference website: exceedance.rms.com. Look for our next blog with more exciting Exceedance updates in the coming weeks!

It’s hard to believe but Exceedance 2017 will be here in just a few weeks, and the excitement is building!

Many companies are sending their cross-functional teams to fast track their ability to put new capabilities to work. And with good reason. With the releases of Risk Modeler on the RMS(one)® platform and Version 17 in April, attendees will experience more tracks (22) and more sessions (105) than in previous years.

There will also be many opportunities for interaction with model experts, up close team training, networking opportunities, and so much more. Enabling your success is the driving force behind Exceedance!

Here are some highlights of the topics we are preparing for you and your team:

Risk Modeler powered by RMS(one): You will obtain a deep understanding of the modeling and analytics that provide the core of the Risk Modeler workflow, including setting up analyses, creating structures and positions, and accessing models from multiple RiskLink® versions for key use cases such as change management, modeling reinsurance programs, and analyzing insurance portfolios.

Version 17 North America Earthquake: The changes to the North America Earthquake Models represent the latest view of risk across the U.S., Canada, and Mexico. We will provide the full scope of the update by delving into the model components, including our unique implementation of the latest source models from the USGS, directional loss changes by region and line of business, and detailed loss change exhibits.

Event Response: How did your business respond to Hurricane Matthew? Learn what we are doing to enhance RMS Event Response, including future offerings, making it work for your business, addressing the main challenges faced during a real-time event like Hurricane Matthew, and more.

U.S. Flood Model: Flood risk management is becoming an increasingly important peril to manage for the insurance industry in the U.S. We’ll provide the latest details on all model components, including the simulation-based model methodology, the innovative vulnerability components of the upcoming RMS U.S. Flood HD Model, and how best to capture opportunities in the evolving U.S. flood market.

The Lab at Exceedance: Solutions, Model Releases, and In-Depth Training with RMS Experts

The Lab will be packed with our latest modeling and software releases, in addition to special areas dedicated to research from Horizons (RMS scientific publication) and resilience initiatives across the globe. Over 50 RMS scientists and modelers will be in The Lab to offer technical insights, training, and support – and will be available for personalized discussions.

There’s a Lot to Be Excited About

This is an important year for all of us in the industry, and RMS is ready to meet our commitments to you as we remain on track for a full schedule of delivery throughout 2017. If you’re attending, be sure to let your colleagues know about all Exceedance has to offer.

To see the full agenda with information about the tracks and sessions, The Lab, speakers, networking events, and more, visit the conference website at: exceedance.rms.com. You can also register for Exceedance here. Look for our next blog with more exciting Exceedance updates in the coming days!

As our event team and subject matter experts continue preparing for Exceedance 2017 in New Orleans on March 20-23, we have announced the sessions for this year’s event.

With the release of Risk Modeler on the RMS(one)® platform and the Version 17 models in April, the Exceedance 2017 agenda is strongly focused on providing attendees with training and enablement that will strengthen their company’s operational effectiveness, agility, and resilience, and create new growth for their business.

Twenty-two tracks with 105 Sessions Focused on Software, Model Releases, and More

Each of the 22 tracks provide a deep dive into our 2017 modeling and software releases. Attendees will have the unique opportunity to learn, train, and interact with RMS and industry experts. They’ll come away with actionable insights into new model releases and software updates.

Selected track highlights include:

Version 17 North Atlantic Hurricane Model changes. The Version 17 North Atlantic Hurricane Model update spans from the Caribbean to Hawaii. It incorporates RMS reconnaissance and local market studies across regions, plus additional updates in the U.S. This track will hone in on the advances made since Version 15.

Version 17 North America Earthquake Model changes. The changes to the North America Earthquake Model are the most important in a decade and deliver the latest view of earthquake risk across three countries. Understanding the model changes will be critical to ensuring that today’s view of risk is brought to market in a timely manner.

New tools and solutions to help own your view of risk. Today’s view of risk is ever-evolving, and this track will focus on new solutions, tools, and key insights to address key market needs, including using RiskAssessor™ with Version 17 models.

High-definition modeling capabilities. High-definition (HD) models deliver the latest science and modeling capabilities beyond those currently available in the industry. Attendees can get hands-on with new HD models and understand the valuable enhancements they provide.

Exposure data, financial structures and positions on the RMS(one) platform. Learn how to manage your exposure data and financial structures and positions on the RMS(one) platform.

If you would like to learn more about all 105 sessions there’s more information here. To register for Exceedance, click here.

With 22 tracks, 105 sessions, and many opportunities to engage with RMS and industry experts to discuss your business imperatives and strategies, Exceedance 2017 is not to be missed. This year’s event offers the chance to join the discussion, learn more than ever before, and get a head start in the marketplace. Look for our next blog in the coming days!

On December 7, 2016, a shallow magnitude 6.5 earthquake struck northern Sumatra in Indonesia, severely damaging or destroying more than ten thousand homes and many businesses, as well as causing over a hundred deaths. The disaster struck a poorer area away from the major cities, where the standards of building design, construction methods, and material quality are not sufficient to withstand such an earthquake.

USGS Shake map for Mw 6.5 Earthquake

We have up-to-date research on local building design and construction practices in Indonesia, which we have incorporated into the latest version of the RMS® Indonesia Earthquake Model. This research was done last year when members of the RMS vulnerability team, including me, visited southeast Asia as part of the process to update the model. We held workshops with local earthquake engineering experts who practice there, and attended an earthquake engineering conference, as well as visiting commercial and industrial buildings, including those under construction, to see first-hand how they were designed and built.

A workshop with local experts

International Conference – Jogja Earthquake in Reflection (May, 2016)

This on-the-ground research provided insights into Indonesia’s rules and practices around construction, seismic design, code enforcement, as well as information on the relative quantities of different types of buildings in the country. We discovered significant differences between mainstream construction and those buildings covered by earthquake insurance, namely:

Past earthquakes have demonstrated that single family dwellings and/or low rise buildings are the most vulnerable building types compared to those built for commercial and industrial use, because of a lack of engineering design, poor construction, and lower material quality.

Buildings outside of major cities are mostly low rises and they may not be designed for earthquake risk.

Major cities such as Jakarta, Bandung, and Surabaya enforce a strict structural design review process for the construction of mid- and high-rise buildings.

Insurance penetration rates are higher for commercial and industrial buildings in and near major cities, with much lower penetration for residential properties in rural areas.

It’s perhaps not surprising that if poorer communities have less insurance protection, that they also cannot afford to invest in the higher quality construction that is designed to better withstand earthquakes. This is one of the primary reasons for the ‘protection gap’. As these countries become more developed, there’s the potential for that gap to start closing. In fact, Indonesia is one of the fastest growing economies in southeast Asia, with the property insurance and (re)insurance market expanding rapidly.

But as the earthquake disaster demonstrated, there are still many poorer regions with low insurance penetration which are also prone to repeated natural disasters. Sadly, there is still a long way to go before people in those places benefit from the resilience in their built environment which other, richer parts of the world may take for granted.